Hey Republican party! You want to make inroads against Obama and the Democrats?
Forget about raising the issue about Obama taking his wife to Broadway for a night out. yes, yes, yes, it's $24,000 to taxpayers. But for God's sake, he is the President. Let him do whatever he wants for a date night. I'd get a luxury box for every Browns game - and happily charge it to the taxpayer. Most people are sympathetic to Obama here. Lay off.
But you better hammer hard on two things that occured this week.
1. GM's head marketing boss, Mark LaNeve, was asked on a call-in show about diesel cars and who GM hasn't pushed that technology here. One of the reasons he stated was that diesel is $1.25 a gallon more expensive than regular gasoline.
Hold the phone there.
That is absolutely incorrect. Right now, diesel is $0.17 less than gasoline.
Diesel costs less than gas. But - the chief marketer at GM does not know, or is not aware of this, fact. How clueless is he?
What does this have to do Obama? This is the company that we are sending another $50 BILLION TO! This is the beahvior we are rewarding!
For God's sake, let them fail.
2) Chrysler. I'm still trying to sort the merger deal between Chrysler and Fiat, but apparently there was a hold up in the Supreme Court because unsecured bond holders (like the Indiana pnesion fund) were not being paid off first; instead, money was going to unsecured bond holders (such as the UAW).
What could this cause? By putting the United Auto Workers' rights above those of secured lenders -- and in the process seemingly upsetting years of established bankruptcy law -- the government risked creating uncertainty about the rule of law, and perhaps discouraging those willing to put capital at risk in America.
OK, one may say - but why aren't all the secured holders wanting a stop to this deal? Why is it just the Indiana pension fund that is pushing for a stop here?
Because most (the majority) of the other secured bond holders of Chrysler are held by institutions like JPMorgan (JPM, Fortune 500), Citibank (C, Fortune 500), Goldman Sachs (GS, Fortune 500), and Morgan Stanley (MS, Fortune 500), all of which were themselves TARP recipients and, therefore, arguably subject to considerable government arm-twisting.
Hmmm......circumventing the rule of law, and arugably playing favorites with TARP. It may take a genius to make a 30 second commercial out of this issue, but I bet it can be done.
So - what we have is Obama:
- lining the pockets of incompetent corporate boobs at GM, and
- playing favorites by picking the UAW and TARP banks over state pension funds with the Chrysler takeover.
I think the actions of Obama are starting to worry many moderates out there....
8 comments:
weren't the initial GM payments (bridge loan if I recall) handed out by the Bush Administration in the fall???? I think he had an (R) after his name.
Just Sayin'
Agree with Jay. Its tough for the Republicans to make headway on this issue when they initated the TARP, played favorites on who they were going to rescue with the banks, and dumping loads of cash into AIG.
Any attack on the bailout can be turned around right against them.
I'm just disgusted at all of them and now is the time for a fiscally responsible independent to step in, because both the D's and the R's are running us into the ground.
Weak, Eric, very weak. The guy is an idiot, but he knows what sells and diesel in the U.S. doesn't. The apathy towards diesel goes back to the late 70's early 80's when they were troublesome, noisy and dirty. It's not until recently that we have ultra-low sulfur available. And the numbers just don't add up. Take the Jetta for an example: regular unleaded gets 30 mpg highway vs. diesel 40 mpg. Price difference is $4500 difference for base Jetta vs. TDI. Now, the TDI is more optioned, but that's all you can get. With my bad math that would take you 225000 miles to recoup with diesel averaging $.20 more a gallon. And yeah, I just noticed that diesel was cheaper. Kind of shocked me 'cause I've been annoyed that it's more expensive for no good reason. So, you expected the car manufactures to dump billions into diesel vehicles when billy bob isn't going to buy one. With gas prices under $4-5 the public is just going to drive less. But, us educated (if that's what you want to call it) people know what kind of mess we're in and want to purchase a nice diesel. But, we're in the minority. I would definitely buy diesel before a hybrid.
Now, you also say let them fail. What do you mean? Let them go out of business? If GM, Chrysler, and Ford went under that's a million employees looking for jobs. Now, I know on this blog, some people believe there are a dearth of well paying good jobs if you just want it badly enough. And there's plenty of disdain for the unions. But, it's starting to worry me that we've moved from a manufacturing wealth producing country to one with a bunch of fat asses (me included) sitting behind computers creating nothing.
A couple of flaws Mer:
1. Ford is healthy and is not going to go bankrupt. I'm surprised this isn't being trumpted non stop to the public.
2. Assumption that if the other two companies go under, the market also disappears with it. People are still going to buy vehicles. The winners will be Ford, Toyota, Honda, etc who will pick up the market share, thus creating jobs that will replace the ones that are lost with GM going under. So the assumption that 1 million jobs are lost doesn't ring true since there still is a market for vehicles in the US.
But what we are seeing is that instead of buying hybrids or diesel, people are not driving as much and thus not needing to replace their cars as often, resulting in a smaller market. This will cost us more jobs than letting GM go under. It was amazing to see the traffic in LA when gas was $5.00. Nobody was on the roads, even during rush hour. We didn't see more hybrids.
And Mer you are right on your math, and I think that is the reason why you don't see people jumping on the diesel or hybrid bandwagon that much anymore. The math just doesn't make sense. You have to run your hybrid into the ground just to try to break even in the long run.
The thing that I would want to hammer Obama Dems about is their love affair with the unions. However, when you make an intelligent point about how unions are choking our manufacturing base by demanding salaries and benefits far higher than the rest of the world and that is why the American car industry is failing, middle America thinks you are coming down on the "working man" and you end up looking like a jerk. In reality, the Dems just want votes, and more people dependent on the government, so they'll do whatever the unions want, even if it means violating every debt seniority guideline ever issued. If you really wanted to "fix" GM, the union needed to be broken, not rewarded. This "new" GM will be the biggest joke of a corporation ever. It's the next Amtrak. We've become a nation of pencil pushers because the world around us is willing to work for less than we are, and as long as we keep coddling people and telling them we'll give them more by taxing the "evil" rich, it will only continue.
The million jobs was just to point out how many people the big 3 employ. And, you make a good point that the non failing auto manufacturers will take up the slack. But, does that mean the 1000s of employees in Ohio will suddenly find a new Toyota plant to work at. It's not that simple.
And I agree, the price point to change people's driving habits is around the $5 mark. $3-4 and I start to think maybe I won't take that road trip to the casinos or anywhere else for that matter. I think at $5/gal, I would probably work from home 2 days a week if I could.
And yeah, I'll defend the unions and I see the rich as evil and not benevolent corporate dictators. Unions are far from perfect but if it gives the employee a living wage I'm all for them.
"Demanding salaries and benefits far higher..." You mean higher salaries than the child labor in 3rd world countries? More benefits meaning more vacation time and better universal health care than Europe has? How elitist is that? That's the problem with the anti union GOP.
Yes, 3rd world countries! That's what these people are competing against. Businesses aren't charities. They've got to cut their costs to the level of their competition to survive. They can't pay American workers more money just because it makes them feel good. They'll get undercut by the rest of the world. Eevryone deserves to earn a "living wage," but they have to provide a marginal benefit. If the American worker is no more skilled & efficient than Dong in China, he doesn't deserve a higher wage. And guess what else, Dong is happy to get what he's getting. If they're not happy with that, get a different job! Life is filled with winners and losers. Not everyone gets a trophy. If that makes me elitist, I am just fine with that.
I thought Vietnam, but i'm a socialist pig.
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